The search for something as great as "Game of Thrones" goes on, although we all know it will never happen. Just as well as GRRM will never manage to finish the book series, "A Song of Ice and Fire", that is behind it all. We now have 2 GOT spin-off shows. "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms" that launched earlier this year can be seen as lightweight Game of Thrones and it got off to a pretty good start.
"House of the Dragon" can certainly not be seen as lightweight. It is however stretched too thin, dragged out too far, and based on poorly written source material. It looks fantastic though for the most part, but it feels like a hollow shell for most of the time. It is impossible to feel anything but hate for most of its characters. They are different shades of assholes and villains with only a few exceptions. The characters are not of GOT quality. The dialogue is not of GOT quality. There are no nude ladies anymore. Sure there are lots of dragons on the show, but CGI-dragons are just not as interesting as nude ladies. It's a bit hard to call it Temu-GOT, but it is certainly not in the same league as GOT.
Season 3 begins with a bang. The Battle of the Gullet is a great sea battle between House Velaryon (led by Lord Corlys [Steve Toussaint]) and the Triarchy (led by trans-Admiral Sharako Lohar [Abigail Thorn]). It is a great episode with lots of action, but it is impossible not to feel that this episode should have been the final episode of Season 2 instead. It would logically have fit in way better in Season 2 that suffered from a severe lack of action.
After the sea battle most of the pace and action comes to a halt. Surely some interesting things happen and some scenes are great and entertaining. You just can't help coming back to the same old conclusion. Why did they decide to drag this show out for 4 seasons, when it would have been so much better, if it had only been 2 or max 3 seasons? Money or greed may be some of the explanation. Whatever the reason was, it was a mistake. We could have had a much better show if they had chosen otherwise. More is not always better. Far from it.
The final episode "The Treasons at Tumbleton" is a blast though. The battle of Tumbleton is almost perfect. If only the rest of the season had been nearly as great.
I loved Milly Alcock's young Rhaenyra in the first half of Season 1, but since then Emma D'Arcy's Rhaenyra has gotten more and more annoying. In season 3 she is a hysterical sobbing woman, who is quite insufferable. She is also hateful, vengeful and vile. She is almost as mad as a certain Daenerys Targaryen will come to be in the future. Madness runs in the family. In fact it wouldn't be too undeserved if someone fed Rhaenyra to his dragon at some point. And just some word of advice from the future Queen Cersei Lannister: if you want to teach the High Septon and his insane followers a lesson, make sure to blow them all up at once. It simply works better.
We have now suffered Ser Criston "Crispy" Cole [Fabien Frankel] for 3 seasons and he hasn't gotten any less annoying along the way. If only someone would shoot him full of arrows, and preferably one of them through his skull. It wouldn't be wrong to parade his head around on top of a spear afterwards.
Daemon [Matt Smith] is a villain too, but he is one of the highlights of the show. He is a man of action. Why think too much, when you can solve all problems with a sword and/or a dragon? I am so glad that he has escaped from the mushroom clouds at Harrenhal. He did almost nothing for most of Season 2, but in Season 3 he is back to kick some ass.
If you think we were done with tripping at Harrenhal, then you couldn't be more wrong. Now it's Aemond Targaryen's [Ewan Mitchell] turn to hang out with the mushroom witch, Alys Rivers [Gayle Rankin].
Ormund Hightower [James Norton] is just as annoying as Ser Crispy. He has some serious grooming going on towards Daeron Targaryen [Benjamin Evan Ainsworth], who actually seems like a good young person. Ormund is cunning, intelligent and has a strategic mind. He knows how to play the Game of Thrones. He is however an evil bastard and if someone rammed a dagger up his ass it wouldn't be undeserved at all.
Alicent Hightower [Olivia Cooke ] has used up her blah-blah quota. She actually only says reasonable things and she has clearly dropped all bullshit. It's just too late now. No one cares what she has to say.
Otto Hightower [Rhys Ifans] is another character that has been easy to hate for a long time. If only someone would chop off his head. I don't care how many attempts it would take...
Ulf the White [Tom Bennett] has been an annoying cunt since he entered the show, but even a cunt can only take so much. All the high-born have treated him like shit, including: Rhaenyra, Daemon and Ormund Hightower. They had their reasons to treat him badly, but they shouldn't look all too surprised if he finally snaps.
Rhaena's [Phoebe Campbell] wild dragon Sheepstealer is hilarious when it fucks around. It has spawned some great memes.
The return of King Aegon II Targaryen [Tom Glynn-Carney] and his undead Sunfyre dragon. He is a terrible man and a super shitty King, but he is certainly entertaining in Season 3. He has now returned as a serious player.
Bye bye, Helaena [Phia Saban]. It's not easy being a nice person in Westeros. Certainly not when surrounded by a family of ugly villains and madmen.
I still think Season 1 is the best HOTD season so far. Season 3 is way better than Season 2, but that didn't take much. Season 2 is best seen on fast forward. Good news though, Season 4 will be the last season, so they won't be dragging out this story any further. In the meantime we should be getting a new Season of AKOT7K, and it seems there is even a movie on the way about Aegon's Conquest. The only thing that is certain not to be on the way are the remaining books of ASOIAF, they will never happen. Not by GRRM anyway.
Rating: 
TV Series Title: House of the Dragon
Season: 3
Episodes: 8
Creators: Ryan J. Condal, George R.R. Martin
This Release: 2026
Genres: Fantasy, Drama
Actors: Matt Smith, Emma D'Arcy, Olivia Cooke, Fabien Frankel, Steve Toussaint, Sonoya Mizuno, Matthew Needham, Harry Collett, Bethany Antonia, Phia Saban, Phoebe Campbell, Tom Glynn-Carney, Gayle Rankin, Abigail Thorn, James Norton, Ewan Mitchell, Abubakar Salim, Clinton Liberty, Freddie Fox, Kieran Bew, Tom Bennett, Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Rhys Ifans
Movie Format: Streaming
Movie Label: HBO Max
Content Type: Movie Review
Language: 
Updated: 2026-08-16 16:19
Created: 2026-08-16 14:07
